The UK’s green transition will happen – with or without Sunak’s government – The Big Issue

“Pragmatism, not ideology,” the prime minister emphasised as he announced a U-turn on the Conservative Party’s major green policies last September. 

The plans, which focused on pushing back the 2030 deadline for selling new petrol and diesel cars and delaying the phasing out of gas boilers was, Rishi Sunak insisted, about doing the sensible thing. It was about not forcing hard-up households to shell out for new kit during a cost of living crisis. It was about “sensible green leadership”. 

Green campaigners didn’t agree, of course. But neither did scientists. Nor the car industry. Nor the energy sector. Though Sunak was keen to stress his government’s commitment to meeting its legally binding target to reach net zero by 2050 – he mentioned it 17 times in his speech – experts rounded on him. 

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“It’s not pragmatic, it’s pathetic,” said professor Dave Reay, executive director of the University of Edinburgh’s Climate Change Institute. “This rolling back on emissions cuts for short-term political gain will undermine the transition to net zero and with it the future opportunities, prosperity and safety of the entire country.” 

Professor Nicholas Stern, chair of the Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment at the London School of Economics, said it sent the “wrong signals to businesses looking to invest” in the green transition. “It is the opposite of good economics,” he said.